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Democratic former Ohio lawmakers threaten lawsuit over Cleveland Browns stadium funding plan • Ohio Capital Journal [1]
['Nick Evans', 'Morgan Trau', 'Kevin Hardy', 'More From Author', '- June', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Coauthors.Is-Layout-Flow', 'Class', 'Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus', 'Display Inline', '.Wp-Block-Co-Authors-Plus-Avatar']
Date: 2025-06-26
A pair of former Democratic state lawmakers warned the General Assembly not to approve a controversial plan to pay for a new Cleveland Browns stadium and other sports facilities in the future. State lawmakers went ahead anyway.
The state budget, approved Wednesday afternoon, includes a provision to take ownership of unclaimed funds that have been in state custody for more than 10 years. It’s a dramatic change for the state.
To this point, Ohio has followed the broadly agreed upon best practice of holding funds in perpetuity until a claimant comes forward.
“These are funds held in trust. This is not state property,” attorney and former state Rep. Jeff Crossman argued. “These funds belong to all those hardworking Ohioans across the state with forgotten savings accounts, uncashed checks, overpaid utility bills — they’re not abandoned.”
Crossman and former Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann, who is also a former state senator, have put together a class action lawsuit, and they’re promising to file it immediately if the stadium funding plan gets signed into law.
“We’re not anti-stadium,” Crossman insisted. “We’re anti-theft.”
Is that legal?
Although Ohio’s proposal is a sharp departure from current state policy, it’s not the first time a state has imposed a deadline on unclaimed funds.
A small handful of states have a statutory cutoff after which funds become state property — a process known as “escheatment.” But those states wait more than twice as long as Ohio is proposing or limit the process to small dollar amounts.
Muddying the waters further, Ohio lawmakers have dipped into the unclaimed funds account several times in recent years.
The plan’s architect, state Sen. Jerry Cirino, R-Kirtland, points to those transfers as vindication. Importantly, those previous transfers amount to borrowing money; unlike Cirino’s plan, no one lost the right to reclaim their property.
Crossman and Dann acknowledge it is legal for the government to take ownership of private property, but only in extraordinary circumstances. They insist the state hasn’t met that bar.
“This is an unconstitutional taking of property,” Dann argued.
He brought up a 2006 eminent domain case in Ohio called Norwood v. Horney. The city of Norwood wanted to seize dozens of homes and businesses to make way for private development. The Ohio Supreme Court rejected that effort.
“The government cannot take private property based on speculative claims of economic benefit alone,” Dann explained. “There must be a legitimate, direct public purpose. This plan fails on both fronts.”
Crossman added that while the Norwood case dealt with real estate, the court made no distinction between real property and any other.
“And let me be blunt,” he insisted, “if this plan collapses in court and delays stadium funding, it’s not going to be our fault. It’s going to be the legislature’s fault, who forced this through knowing full well that it was unconstitutional.”
What’s next?
Following his chamber’s vote, Senate President Rob McColley said “I’m confident we’re on good constitutional grounds.” He added he’s skeptical Dann and Crossman will be able to prove their clients have suffered actual damages from the changes.
“Because everybody who has money in the fund still has 10 years to come get the money,” he argued, alluding to a ten-year grace period for those whose funds are part of the first wave swept into stadium fund.
“And so there is no harm, there are no damages for those individuals,” McColley added. “So I think it’s going to be a tough case for them to prove all the way up.”
In addition to establishing a new funding stream for the Browns stadium, lawmakers added in a provision that will likely make it easier for the team to pick up stakes in Cleveland, and settle in nearby Brook Park instead. After Art Modell moved the first iteration of the Browns to Baltimore, rechristening the team as the Ravens, lawmakers placed restrictions on owners moving teams after receiving public support.
The budget tweaked that provision. It now only applies when moving a team out of state.
McColley defended the change, arguing it still requires teams fulfill the terms of their lease and that tethering the team to its current location was never the intention. “That would have been an insane intention to have when the law was passed,” he added.
“What this is doing is protecting the taxpayers,” McColley argued. “Basically saying you have to fill out your lease, you have to satisfy your obligation, and if you receive state funding, you have to remain in the state of Ohio.”
Despite criticism of the plan, lawmakers are certainly treating it as a going concern. The Senate’s budget calls for transferring $1.7 billion out of the unclaimed funds trust, but that first draft only appropriated the $600 million the Browns want for their stadium.
But after negotiations with the House, lawmakers want to appropriate a full $1 billion for sports and cultural developments. That puts $400 million at the ready for other facilities around Ohio.
“They’re saying we don’t care that you own this money,” Dann argued, “We don’t care that we’ve appointed ourselves, the state, as the fiduciary for that money. We’re going to just dump that responsibility right now and give it out to somebody who has helped us in our campaigns. That is not a constitutional process.”
Gov. Mike DeWine could always veto the provision, but to this point he has declined to take a position on using unclaimed funds. However, DeWine’s spokesman Dan Tierney criticized the preemptive lawsuit threat.
“Wow,” he said in an email. “We haven’t even received the budget bill yet, let alone the Governor having signed it. But given that the former Attorney General gave us the Sunshine Express, his need for speed shouldn’t be surprising.”
During his time as attorney general, Dann added flames to the side of a government SUV and decals dubbing it the Sunshine Express to highlight his office’s work on public records. But that SUV wound up at the shop in the first place because a staffer in Dann’s office turned it in with extensive body damage and no explanation.
But for their part, Dann and Crossman expressed some optimism that DeWine might step in.
“Republicans do not have the corner on bad ideas in this building,” Dann said, arguing Democrats have been on the wrong side of plenty of unconstitutional proposals. “Our hope is that the serious legislators and the governor who stood on these steps and swore an oath to the Constitution will decide to follow the Constitution.”
Crossman added that as a former attorney general himself, DeWine “should recognize the constitutional problems.”
“You can’t balance a budget on broken promises, and you can’t build a stadium on stolen property,” Crossman argued. “And if the legislature won’t defend Ohioans’ rights, we will.”
Follow Ohio Capital Journal Reporter Nick Evans on X or on Bluesky.
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